Sopwith

In my book, selling more tickets than you have seats on an airplane, with the intent that a certain number of purchasers will have their tickets dishonoured, is outright fraud.

The airlines attempt to justify this practice by saying that without overselling, the cost of no shows would be passed on to all customers. But they also say that less than 1% of passengers are denied boarding due to overselling, and we can safely assume that a certain percentage of no shows will have non-refundable tickets. Hence, the actual effect on ticket prices is minuscule, and I expect most customers would be willing to pay an increase of <1% to be protected from IDB. So that argument doesn't hold water.

Why are we so afraid to call overselling what it is: fraud?

MSPeconomist

Sorry, but I would NOT be willing to pay extra, cartainly not 1%, to guarantee that airlines never IDB anyone. In over four million miles of flying, I've never faced an IDB, but I fully understand the rationale for overbooking.

davie355

No seat can ever be guaranteed. Schedule changes and aircraft swaps cause IDBs too. Anybody IDB'd will be compensated, so it's not as if they are SOL.

RustyC

I can say from personal experience that I get a lot fewer VDBs than I used to in the 90s, so airlines are clearly better at projecting. The IDB is a big stat that is used against them and also often leads to an ugly scene, so airlines will try hard to avoid it with VDB offers, sometimes successive escalating ones. They have to follow procedures to the letter if they can't get the VDBs even via escalating offers, so the person involuntarily bumped could well be on the way to something important (daughter's wedding?)

People also aren't aware that most ULCCs have no interline agreements, which can greatly limit and diminish alternatives. Spirit was looking for volunteers on a recent flight I was on and offering a (restricted) free ticket supposedly systemwide, but in asking which flight I'd get on if I volunteered, they told me the same one 24 hours later. No, thanks. They'll only put you on their own flights, which greatly increases the chances of being strung along on standby.

Yoshi212

Also remember that it can be rather lucrative to be denied boarding; involuntarily or voluntarily. I flew for a whole year for free using vouchers. Now, I often travel with flexibility which helps get those that "need" to get to their destination and keep me flying at lower costs to myself. I've double many double bumps and almost got a triple bump but instead was given international F instead.

sbm12

But you don't get to write the regulations on the subject.

Because it is not that. Oversale potential is disclosed. Were it not then the claim might be stronger. But it is.

pshuang

I disagree with your math and your conclusions.

Suppose a flight is on an aircraft with 100 economy seats. The airline projects it will sell 20 seats at a high fare, 60 seats at a medium fare, and 20 seats at a low fare. (I'm simplifying the number of fare buckets.) Historical data about passengers buying seats on this particular route and date/time of day allows the airline to estimate that 20% (4) of the high fare passengers will no-show (but cancel their tickets in time), 10% (6) of the medium fare passengers will no-show, and 5% (1) of the low fare passengers will no-show. That means the airline that only ever books to 100% of real capacity is likely to leave 11 seats unsold. The airline could re-run its yield management software pretending that the aircraft seats 105 or even seats 111 if it wants to be aggressive. Or it could leave the long-in-advance yield management algorithms alone and just hope to sell in the last day or two some of the 11 seats at a high fare. Suppose it does both... re-run yield management as if the plane had 105 seats, and then overbooks further in the last couple of days by 6 last minute high fares. And darn... it made a mistake in its estimates, had 101 passengers show up at the gate, and had to solicit one volunteer denied boarding passenger (VDB). There's your 1%. And yet there was quite a lot of room for the airline to have been able to increase its total revenue for this flight, much more than just by 1%.

CodeAdam10

Overselling is a calculated risk for the airlines. I don't blame them for maximizing what is available at their disposal. Personally as a flyer - I get it - because at times I do a) book last-minute myself and b) tend to change to a different flight / date even a couple of hours before departure depending on schedule. Airlines have plenty of historic data for these scenarios and when you look at the possibilities of delayed incoming connecting passengers, late arriving passengers, last-minute family emergencies, etc; it makes sense to oversell to maximize.

Of course their calculations don't always work and they have rules in place for that. Airlines don't want a IDB just as much as a passenger...and the poor GA certainly does not.

mikew99

I actually agree with the OP: I consider much of what the airlines do in their treatment of passengers to be fraudulent, but unfortunately, I don't write the rules, so IDB is not illegal. The good thing is that at least the government enforces certain penalties when the carriers fail in their duty to the customer in this way (although not nearly to the level that I would like to see).

Sopwith

I am a little surprised at how people will rush to defend the airlines over what is at best an odious and disingenuous practice, whatever you call it and whether it is legal or otherwise. A few thoughts come to mind.

Yes, the practice is disclosed, but not unless you dig deep into the fine print. A less sophisticated traveller who books on a major airline website would not run across the information unless they check the fine print. It is not exactly obvious when you book.

Most of us frequent flyers are knowledgeable and experienced enough to know how to avoid being IDB'd. However, a large fraction of travellers are not thus, and would have no idea that they are not buying a ticket on a specific flight, but rather they are buying a lottery ticket in which the odds of winning are quite high, but not 100%. What do you say to them? What do you say to the family of four I saw in SLC a couple of years ago who were bumped from the last flight of the day because there weren't enough takers for the VDB offers made? They had no idea it was coming and were left stranded with two young kids in tow.

Perhaps not fraudulent in the strict legal sense, but no less despicable.

moondog

Pay 1% extra in order to preempt a 1:10,000 scenario? Fabulous idea.

Yoshi212

Were they actually stranded or just disappointed & frustrated with not getting on the plane? All denied boardings I have seen come with new flights, comp & arrangements for hotel and transport. If actually stranded that is a big mistake on the airline's duty of carriage.

Often1

Why does OP use the term "we" when asking about fraud? "We" aren't afraid to use the term. "We" don't use it because it isn't fraud. Not by anybody's definition. That's because it's in the contract to which OP agrees when he purchases an air ticket.

There is nothing deceptive or underhanded about the practice. It's right out there in the open. Air carriers publicly state that they overbook.

OP apparently read a story in a newspaper about something that happened at a US airport several years ago and has decided that based on what he read, the law ought to be changed and that "we" are afraid. That's simply rubbish.

His math is off too. Overbookings may run at around 1%, but actual involuntary denied boardings run way, way, way below 1%. That is because most overbookings resolve themselves through no shows & misconnects. Those that remain are resolved through voluntary reroutes where customers are happily paid to reroute. Only in an infintesimal % of situations is there actually IDB.

It pays to do thorough research.

duchy

I don't think I've ever seen an IDB -nor know of anyone who has suffered one (and that includes my clients when I worked on a very high volume global blue chip account dealing with their business travel as well as "normal people").

VDB - Yes -and taken advantage of them when I have enough flexibility in my schedule too . I have my eye on one on an AA domestic flight for next week- I tend to check loads so I know which of my flights are "at risk" of overbooking , I've had VDB payments TATL that were more than the cost of the ticket .

I don't see it as fraud -more an opportunity for me .

I wonder how often the OP has suffered an IDB

Tchiowa

If that is what they were doing you would be right. But what they are actually doing is selling more tickets than seats with the expectation that a certain percentage of flyers won't show and they will have enough seats. They accept that that means that some times someone won't be able to board, but that is not their INTENT and that's what makes the difference between fraud and making the best of a bad situation.

If they could get away with making anyone who didn't show pay for the flight anyway, they would stop. They can't. So they make the best of a bad but normal situation.